Sex/Gender Wars - What would be a win?

The compromise happened in 2004 [with the Gender Recognition Act] and in 2021 women are being raped and assaulted in previously single sex spaces, they are being injured or losing places in female sport, they are no longer permitted to choose the language to describe their own experiences and children are being set on a course of life long medical treatment

These are facts. This is the core of the problem. Women have been compromising on this issue for years. The results make life worse and worse for women.

Every ‘compromise’ means women giving away some of our rights, and children being exposed to more harm.

all and always and some an sometimes both involve pretending that men (as a class) aren't violent to women (as a class), and don't use women as sexual props in a thoroughly unpleasant way.

Didn't see this thread when it first came up. I saw a tweet last week that summed up a lot of the 'polarisation'. It said it all came down to disagreeing on which sex segregated spaces trans people should access under which circumstances. It said at the extremes you had 'all and always' and 'none and never' and then in between you had 'sometimes and sometimes'. I think the 'sometimes and sometimes' people, like Kathleen Stock, present the biggest threat to the TRAs.

This is an excellent point. "Sometimes and sometimes" requires effort though. It's not a belief in innate gender pinkness or blueness.

"All and always" is an acceptance of a belief system. "None and never" is both a rejection of a belief system and (often) a change in position from "sometimes and sometimes".

The logical conclusion of "all and always" is entirely unisex provision for all humans, but that isn't what is wanted. "All and always" is the least logical position to take because it defeats itself; entirely unisex provision is not validating enough.

Didn't see this thread when it first came up. I saw a tweet last week that summed up a lot of the 'polarisation'. It said it all came down to disagreeing on which sex segregated spaces trans people should access under which circumstances. It said at the extremes you had 'all and always' and 'none and never' and then in between you had 'sometimes and sometimes'. I think the 'sometimes and sometimes' people, like Kathleen Stock, present the biggest threat to the TRAs.

This summary doesn't address the healthcare for children issues. I expect the polarisation here is to suggest we ignore gender related aspects and focus on other underlying causes of distress and ignore all other underlying causes or potential underlying causes and focus on gender issues. In between would be calling to gather more evidence about what is going on and why in relation to gender issues, and in the meantime be open minded about all possibilities.

The compromise happened in 2004 and in 2021 women are being raped and assaulted in previously single sex spaces, they are being injured or losing places in female sport, they are no longer permitted to choose the language to describe their own experiences and children are being set on a course of life long medical treatment before they are legally old enough to consent to sex or obtain a driving licence.

There is no room for compromise because what's being demanded is total capitulation, I refuse. The GRA needs to be repealed, it sets a precedent for very bad law making. Other than that I fully support the rights of trans people to live their life free from all discrimination or harassment, this can easily be achieved without eroding women's rights, it just requires us to stop enabling lying about biological sex.

The only thing I want to "win" back is all the rights we have lost so far, the right to the safety of single sex spaces, fairness in sport and the right to express myself freely without being vilified.

Glad to see you saying that. I felt as if I'd wandered into a parallel universe where everyone else knows that of course you can change your sex... Totally batshit.

every single one of those letters was frankly cuckoo. in a wide field, i think this was my favourite piece of batshittery:

However, the article itself refers to the more damning opinion that the professor expressed, that people cannot change their biological sex. Regardless of how narrowly anyone chooses to interpret that statement, it does seem to deny trans men and trans women, or those who are intersex, the right to exist. The Guardian’s poor record of reporting on trans matters continues

bonkers

So long since I last read the Guardian that I am horrified by all those science-denying, be-kind responses.

No mention of the fact that Phillippa Punchard has written a book on 'gender pioneers' either. Very disingenuous.

Perhaps you could explain why a) it is a war and b) how come you think the erosion of women’s rights after the event is a debate.

You think you don’t have power or privilege in op.

So what do you have then every time you access a female space? You do it knowing that women as a sex class were not consulted on how to keep them as sex class safe whilst you access those spaces, let alone asked if it was ok to access the spaces in the first place.

This is what we mean by power. You have power over us. Do you understand now how this is holding power over women?

I don’t want to turn this into a you versus us. It never should have been like that. Men made decisions for us. They made them for you. And as a former man, you went along with them… and your presence in women’s toilets is contributing to the erosion of women’s rights whether or not you choose to accept this.

So why can’t men’s spaces be unisex? And women’s spaces single sex? Why can’t the bandwidth of what it means to be a man be widened? It would solve all multitude of issues.

I'm sorry, I don't buy any argument about a study.

There's a reason it's called an ideology. 😁

What is good to see Nefelibata33, is that at least Dr Hilary Cass has recognised that there is simply not enough evidence of the benefits of hormonal therapy for adolescents and that the current adolescent cohort has changed to being dominated by females. Which needs thorough research as a ‘one size fits all’ solution is harmful.

cass.independent-review.uk/entry-5-evidence-epidemiology-october-2021/

I am very glad that the NHS will no longer be able to just ignore it all and their poor record keeping as you seem to advocate (because of 1 detransitioner you say).

And being back to 'banning transition' is... I mean why?

I haven't seen anyone who has ever said that adults should be banned from paying for these particular cosmetic procedures.

They are adults. Adults have all sorts of cosmetic surgery including very unusual. Adults get tattooed from head to toe. I once met a man in a pub who had full body much of head/ face. And a fully tattooed cock. The tattoo (he said) grew into foliage and a flower at the um. Top. When erect.

I'm good friends with an ex piercer who once did one of the most pierced men in England. He apparently had so many and so deep/ across cock that he had to piss into a jam jar or it went everywhere.

Each to their own. Adults.

Kids, different. Very different.

But the question originally was do you want to ban surgical transition. OP is adult.

Well no. I can't think of seeing that position anywhere.

So why does it keep being raised????

You posted these figures with no reference as to where they came from.

Someone else says studies etc and you say you don't trust studies?

Yet you quoted I assume a study when you posted those numbers.

???

Additionally. Most transpeople do not have genital surgery and that's totally reasonable. It's hugely invasive, in an area with loads of major blood vessels etc. Risky. Recovery must be awful. Results are far from guaranteed. Potential loss of sexual function. Removal of testes/ ovaries is huge hormonally. I know for women- instant menopause, loads of impacts. Really big negative impacts. For men it must have consequences. It's irreversible.

When you talk about transition you mean genital surgery? Or something else?

Other than stopping the prescribing of harmful drugs to children, I'm not seeking to change or constrain anything that trans people choose to do. GC feminism is not about trans people's rights. It's about the right of women to have their sex-based rights and identity properly recognised and protected by the Law and society.

Makes me think of my grandmother, saying sweetly to someone in a shop when I was a kid "If you're going to try to patronise someone dear, learn how to do it first."

And previous other threads purpleboy to be fair.

I think we can safely say that some posters have a very skewed sense of their own intelligence when they post statements like this:

Have something healthy for breakfast, and come back when you can say something intelligent.

You should take your own advice Nefelibata33 and while your doing so have a ponder on these statements you made:

I'm not going to tell anyone how to live their lives, I don't think anyone should have the right to tell anyone else how to live their lives.

Think really hard and you will see that there are many ways in which we are all told to a greater or lesser degree how to live our lives.

I don't think anyone should deny another human being happiness in life.

Again, think very hard about this, there are myriad reasons why one human being's happiness is to a greater or lesser degree not allowed completely free rein.

I think it's cruel to deny a human their happiness.

Apply some critical thinking to this, I am sure you know what critical thinking is, and muse upon the ways in which one person's happiness can be and is curtailed when it negatively impacts on other humans.

Nefelibata33

Just adding this particular study here too. You might not have actually read this one. But you should. It is linked to the upcoming WPATH guidelines review.

Just so you are aware that in defending transition for everyone, you are also advocating for children to transition. You claim it is life saving… yet Baker and team reviewed 20 studies on trans treatments and mental health and when it came to adolescents, the findings were that there is no convincing evidence of improvement to mental health at all.

Baker, K. E., et al, (2021) Hormone Therapy, Mental Health and Quality of Life Among Transgender People: A Systematic Review. Journal of the Endocrine Society.

academic.oup.com/jes/article/5/4/bvab011/6126016

Quality of Life

Among adolescents, a mixed-gender prospective cohort (n = 50) showed no difference in QOL scores after a year of endocrine interventions, which included combinations of GnRH analogues and estrogen or testosterone formulations [30]. No study found that hormone therapy decreased QOL scores. We conclude that hormone therapy may improve QOL among transgender people. The strength of evidence for this conclusion is low due to concerns about bias in study designs, imprecision in measurement because of small sample sizes, and confounding by factors such as gender-affirming surgery status.

And this under Depression

Among adolescents, 2 mixed-gender prospective cohorts (n = 50 and n = 23, respectively) showed improvements in depression scores after 1 year of treatment with GnRH analogues and estrogen or testosterone formulations (both P < 0.001) [30, 38]. Another prospective study reported that BDI scores improved almost by half among adolescents (n = 41) after a mean of 1.88 years of treatment with GnRH analogues to delay puberty (P = 0.004) [34]. The overall improvement after several subsequent years of testosterone or estrogen therapy in this cohort (n = 32) was smaller, however, resulting in no significant change from baseline [35]. No study found that hormone therapy increased depression.

Anxiety

Among adolescents, 1 prospective study saw mean anxiety scores in a mixed-gender group (n = 23) improve from 33.0 ± 7.2 to 18.5 ± 8.4 after 1 year (P < 0.001) [38], but another reported no changes in anxiety after approximately 2 years of puberty delay treatment with GnRH analogues and 4 years of hormone therapy (n = 32) [35].

Suicide

The risk of bias for this study was serious due to the difficulty of identifying appropriate comparison groups and uncontrolled confounding by surgery status and socioeconomic variables such as unemployment. We cannot draw any conclusions on the basis of this single study about whether hormone therapy affects death by suicide among transgender people

I’m not surprised that women and girls are considered acceptable collateral damage, if we are considered at all.

I’m not even surprised that the same people think we ought to accept our role as collateral damage.

But I am surprised that they think we do accept that.

people here who want to restrict aspects of trans people's lives that have literally no affect them

I am still waiting for blueberry to come back and explain what restrictions they think we are discussing that literally has no affect on women and children.

But I guess it was just another unfounded and hyperbolic snipe from the sideline.

Your numbers don’t stack up. Particularly the hyperbolic handwaving of 1 in 100 000’s.

And you seem to have very little curiosity about the lives and futures of the cohort that makes up the majority of the current young transitioner numbers. That of teenaged females, a very large proportion of whom have underlying comorbidities.

Don’t worry though, you join a long line of posters who also like to forget that groups needs. Although it is hard to accept, I guess, just where this discrimination against these young females will lead and that you supported it.

I'm sorry, I don't buy any argument about a study. It doesn't sound very likely to me, and I don't know anything about this study, when it was done, or how accurate it was.

So you don’t look up the study. You don’t try to find out more about the methodology, the number of people studied, the reputation of the journal it was published in, or anything about it. You just reject it without any knowledge of it. Because Nodebate.

You keep your eyes shut and push your fingers in your ears. That lets you keep saying the same untrue things and keep feeling virtuous.

Do you understand that you are harming yourself as well as others?